Rant Mode Equals One: M$ Losing Ugly on Kerberos

Embrace and Extend--Right!

May 19, 2000

By
Paul Ferris

The recent rumblings between
Slashdot and
Microsoft
may be Microsoft's idea of defending their turf,
but ultimately they will serve to undo any
vestiges of positive public opinion left for the software giant.

Ignoring all of that, Microsoft has once again
decided that the moral line in the sand was
nothing but an annoyance--they decided that
Slashdot members were posting "trade secrets" and
threatened legal action.

And now, Slashdot's
lawyers have pretty much stepped up to the plate,
and told the software giant where to go today. I
can see where this is headed, as Microsoft's
chairman Bill Gates hates to lose--at any and all
costs. Likely the cost in this case is going to
be a loss far bigger than a legal battle and some
hokey protocol extensions being removed from a
web site.

Few people in the audience are
going to side with Microsoft, once they catch
wind of the details of the case before them.
Possibly Slashdot is on some kind of precarious
legal footing here, what with the DMCA and all--but their moral footing is, unfortunately for
Microsoft, solid as titanium on concrete.

After the lawyers, judges and politicians are
done, in other words, the public will be looking
at Microsoft and wondering why several billion
dollars and a 90% lock on desktop systems is not
enough to satisfy them. Why are they picking
this fight, one that they might win legally, but
one they will surely lose in the court of public
opinion--and why now?

I can only speculate.

I think that the powers-that-be at
Microsoft are still looking in at their
incredibly huge war chest of money, and thinking
that they can weather any storm--regardless of
moral footing or public opinion. They likely
think that enough money spent on PR, some luck
with the trial, possibly some more dirty tricks,
and they can be back where they were before.

It's clear to almost everyone else that those
days are over. The court of public opinion has
already convicted them. Judge Jackson has
already convicted them. They've lost quite a few
battles of late and the number of people
actually paying lip service to the company has
been dwindling at a rapid rate. Although, like
the Tories who supported the King of England
and were loyal during the American revolution--there are hold-outs still.

People who
refuse to look at the immorality of the company.
People who will not examine the trial
testimony. These people are typically only
staring at the incredible bottom line of the
company, or rather the one it had before its stock
price plummeted recently. Possibly even still,
as the money involved is still sizable.

These
people don't care about moral issues, they don't
care about other people's choice to use
quality, non-privacy compromising, secure
software. They don't care about choices,
period. They don't care about true software
innovation, or protecting the companies in this
country that actually produce innovation. They
only worship money and count that as the only
sign of success.

I know I would be glad to
view Microsoft as a success story if the company
produced quality products that were the result
of their own innovation, without breaking the
laws and moral boundaries that we accept as
normal in this country. That is simply not the
case, however, as many people who have read my
columns in the past know.